The Bad Boys' Soft Boys' Lonely Hearts Club - The Full Package

The Dead Mother's Club

"What are you doing, babe?" I ask Hayden.

He stops at some bushes by the dirt path we are on, taking a handful of wildflowers by the wayside at the time.

"Well, I just think it's rude to go to a funeral empty-handed," says Hayden. "Of course, I would've preferred a little more time to prep some muffins or something."

"yeah, but, ain't like Okayden's family the protector of the forest and shit?" adds Brayden, on the back of the group, kicking his feet on the ground like a bored teenager whose mom ran into her best friend at the supermarket and has spent the last hours talking about what that bitch Brenda at work did this time. Fuck Brenda.

The man guiding us through the forest, Trevor the Man-man, gives us a gentle chuckle as the click-clack of his cane/staff pierces through the silence. The forest is beautiful, if thick. Dummy thick. I can't see beyond a few trees due to density. But not a sound of rustling leaves is heard, as if the whole forest was mourning as well.

"The Tri-state forest alliance does not work like that, young one," says the Man-man. "The protector of the forest is not a king, nor owns the land. They are merely a mediator between the races that live here. See, it all started with the first magika war, when-"

"I'm sorry, sir, but I don't remember asking, sir," I say. Rude? Perhaps, but that sounds like plot. I don't care about plot. I just wanna get Okayden and get this over with.

"I want to hear this story," says the LB, walking smugly like a smug smuggler.

"Nobody asked your fucking opinion. Be quiet and seek your natural death."

Trevor the Man-man laughs once again. "I understand, no explanations. Master Okayden will surely explain this in a succinct manner when you meet with him. He has such a beautiful way with words."

"Yeah, right. He didn't even tell us his mother died," says Hayden.

I hear Brayden whistle in a very suspicious manner all of a sudden, hiding his hands behind his back.

"Brayden? Is there anything you need to tell us?" I ask him.

"no...?" he says/ask.

"Are you telling me, or asking me?"

"Fufufu, the gloopy nazz's heart is beating like a drum," says the LB.

That's weirdo for "fucking lying," me thinks. "Brayden, spit it out."

Brayden stops dead in his tracks, I think because his eyes are pinned to the ground. "well, three days ago, schooby-dork gave me this piece of paper before disappearing. i thought he was giving me something in a foreign language or some shit."

Brayden produces a piece of paper from his pocket, all covered in snot and spit. It's obvious it was yet another victim of Brayden's white hole. Hayden takes it from his hand and slowly folds it.

"So, what does it say?" I ask.

"It's a poem," says Hayden. "From John Donne. For Whom The Bells Toll."

"The Metallica song?"

The LB snatches the paper from Hayden's hand with that bottom energy of his'. "Ah, a poem. The holy slovos of a bard signing to the soul of art. Too much to handle for a moodge of your... intelligence."

"Better start reading, Pepe le Bitch," I say as I take a step toward him.

The LB clears his throat, and with a theatrical bow, begins to read.

"No man is an island,

Entire of itself.

Each is a piece of the continent,